Coming to the end of another year there was again a lot of turnover at the top, middle, and bottom of the goalie rankings from last October until now. One steady part has been Dustin Wolf at the top – though he will drop this summer as his extension kicks in – and the presence of longer-term extensions at reasonable price tags holding Logan Thompson, Mackenzie Blackwood, and Karel Vejmelka in the top-10. With the price of a starter having gone up even in the last year, and with it set to explode even further thanks to the rising cap, those mid-range numbers on extensions of five years or more for the tier-1 goalies should be treated like gold. Brandon Bussi's cheap extension also keeps him near the top, though his place as a starter is less assured, which gets reflected in the tier list.

But first – out in early April (April 10) and updated right up until the playoffs, Dobber’s 20th (20!!) annual Interactive playoff draft list! Use Dobber’s own picks, or run your own playoff scenario using the brackets provided and print your own list! Preorder it here.

Standard pre-rankings note:

Cap hit is used for the player cost, so if your league uses salary or AAV, please account for that, as it can greatly change the impact of entry-level deals. The rankings are set up so as to provide the most value in the current season, while providing some value in future years, based on modeling for predicted salary increases and production growth.

The stats used for the goaltenders attempt to balance both ratio stats as well as volume. For those of you with variations towards either end of the spectrum, leaning more towards volume or rate stats, you will want to account for that change in value. Same thing goes for setting variations such as: number of teams, salary space, or roster positions. This list is made to be a baseline guide for player evaluation, and to promote discussion and understanding of how to optimize rosters in a cap league setting.

The goalie list comes not only with a value system, but with value tiers. The tiers (also computed by a formula of mine) represent a more general view on a goalie's value taking into account a few overarching factors. Cheap backups can have higher ratings but show up lower down the tier rankings. The high ranking is due to their low cap hits coupled with an established floor with some possible upside. The lower tier is a result of them having uncertain volume, and the lower likelihood of hitting their upside in any given year. In general, aim to have the highest rated players if you are looking to be most cap efficient, but use the tiers if you just want to focus on having the best goalies and you are comfortable paying a little more for that security (my preference is usually to lean towards the more cap efficient options because of how variable goalies can be).

If you note a mistake, or have any further questions about the ranking system, please let me know. You can find me on Twitter here @alexdmaclean.

Comments help with optimizing the values, because they're not perfect and they never will be.

We're sticking with the +/- 5.0 rating that Dobber uses on all of his rating schemes as the range for approximately equivalent value. The skater and goalie rankings are synched so that the value of a skater against a goalie can be compared, though the scale of the ratings has changed a little since the last update.